


Soulmates

by ErosRose



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, Soulmate AU, colour soulmate au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-20
Updated: 2017-03-20
Packaged: 2018-10-08 13:06:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10387296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ErosRose/pseuds/ErosRose
Summary: Intending to be an anthology series, some related and unrelated one-shots of various pairings in the show Riverdale using all of the soulmate AU's and tropes that you can think of! (You can also request any you might want to see).First chapter includes some Beronica and some Jughead X OC





	

The sleepy town of Riverdale was illuminated with lights and colours, _Pop’s Chok-Lit-Shoppe_ flashed a warm neon red, reflecting against the hoods of the cars that sat parked outside in the cold dark chill. The words _Twilight Drive-In_ sat prettily against a dark blue backdrop held above the rusting letters ‘ _Closing Soon_ ’, the abandoned sign creaked under the pressure of a strong wind that struck it heavily. The large Town Hall stood proudly painted in the freshest of lemon colours, the shadows of the night illuminated the deceitful corruption that lay hidden behind the closed doors.

A gang of teenagers occupied the space in one of booths at the diner, Archie Andrews with his flaming locks of auburn hair, Betty Cooper with her glistening emerald eyes, Veronica Lodge and her sultry red lipstick, Jughead Jones wearing his infinitely present grey beanie, and Erica Mars undoubtedly plain with her dull brown hair and eyes to match.

You were considered lucky if you could view the world with its full spectrum of colours, if you could notice the difference between the light pink that hummed with the rise of the sunset and the cold blue that descended upon the misty town of Riverdale as the sun set. Seeing the hues of the world meant one thing, _that you had met your soulmate_.

For some it was one look at a stranger, maybe from across the room, a quick glance or a longing stare and suddenly the greyscale that was at once omnipresent bled with colour. Sometimes it was with one blink and the harsh brightness of the golden sun would blind them. It had been recorded on a number of occasions that colours would begin to make themselves present one by one, over a number of months or years. One day the person in question looked at someone who had been there all along and noticed the flecks of greens that dotted their crystal blue eyes; _finally_ the collection of colours now complete.  

The fateful night that brought Veronica Lodge into _Pop’s Chok-Lit-Shoppe_ was also the very night that Betty Cooper saw the world in its rightful way. Cued by the chime of the bell above the door, Archie’s jaw hang slack, Betty whipped her head around to view the black swan that glided into the diner, donned in a long black cape, with the dress, shoes and bag to match. If it hadn’t been for the signature red lipstick that was deftly applied to Ronnie’s supple lips, the young blonde girl may not have realised that her life had just been monumentally altered. The red hue of Pop’s diner reflected in the whites of Betty’s eyes, her golden hair sitting atop of her head as though it was a halo.

 _‘Hi,’_ _Veronica smiled down at Betty with her deep and warm brown eyes._

Archie continued to converse with Veronica, oblivious as to what was transpiring between the two girls. Betty stared on at Ronnie in astonishment, any and all words caught on her tongue, that was until Pop returned with an order for Lodge and the raven-haired teen disappeared into the nightfall. From that moment, life as Betty Cooper had known it had changed, in a twist of fate she had the met the one person currently walking the earth that was made entirely for her.

 _Yes_ , you _were_ lucky if you could see the world in colour, you _were_ lucky if when you stared back into the eyes of your beloved you saw the world, you were the _luckiest_ if they saw it reflected back into their own eyes, but what about when they didn’t?

-

Erica Mars was eight years old when she first saw the world in colour. Running through the playground of Riverdale Elementary, the whole class was involved in a mass game of ‘tag’ and a tall Reggie Mantle was close on the back of her heels. She ran as fast as she could, weaving through the crowds of kids until she felt his tough hard hands on her back, he had caught up with her and pushed her as hard as he could before shouting.

_‘Tag you’re it!’_

He laughed as he ran into the crowd, leaving Erica flat on the floor, her knees stinging with the fresh pain caused by concrete gazing the tender skin of her knees.

_‘Are you okay?’ A soft voice from above asked._

Erica looked up at a young boy, if she could see in colour there wouldn’t have been much to admire, he was dressed from head to toe in array of blacks and greys, even his hair was a black as the night sky. Erica held back a sniffle, determined not to cry over a little cut, she nodded firmly and looked at the hand that boy had offered out to her.

_‘Reggie’s a jerk.’ He muttered._

Erica let out a watery laugh and the boy above her smiled. She looked down to the graze on her knee and almost recoiled in shock, tiny beads of red liquid oozed from the stinging graze. Her gaze turned curiously back to the young boy standing in front of her, his hand still outstretched, tentatively she took it.

_‘I’m Jughead Jones,’ he smiled, ‘the third.’_

_‘Erica – Erica Mars.’_

She kept the little secret to herself, at the tender age of eight she wasn’t very sure what to do with the information, so she hid the fact that she could see both the bright and dull colours of the world. She hid it from her parents, her teachers, her friends and most definitely hid it from Jughead Jones.

In their youth Erica was uninterested in pursuing anything romantic with the boy the universe had decidedly marked as her soulmate, she couldn’t deny however that she felt inherently drawn to him. After their first real encounter at Riverdale Elementary the two children were as thick as thieves, Erica was happily welcomed into the small group that originally consisted of Jughead Jones, Archie Andrews and Betty Cooper, and it only expanded as the years went on.

As those years passed by however the pressure of finding your soulmate grew, Betty constantly gushed throughout middle school about the day when she would meet her soulmate and how finally the complicated pieces of ‘ _the puzzle that was life’_ would fall into place. At one point she would admit that she had hoped it was Archie. She imagined one day she’d wake up and stare across at him from her bedroom window, that the panels that framed his bedroom window would appear a serene yellow, the trees on either side of their fences would blossom with vibrant green leaves and his rich dark red hair would messily fall in front of his eyes as he sent her a boyish smile. Each morning she woke however and was still presented with the same grey dilemma.

Despite her disheartenment at the prospect of never finding her true love she would still coo and romanticise over the notion. In response Erica would feign excitement at the possibilities of one day meeting her match, unwilling to let on that she could see how the sun reflected on the golden crown of Betty Cooper and how Archie Andrews’ hair held many shades of red depending on the time of day.

Jughead Jones would always say the same thing regarding his soulmate.

_‘The day I see in colour is the day Pop makes a burger that is too big for me to eat.’_

Together the group would laugh yet Erica could not deny the first time he had spoken along those lines she had felt a little crushed.

_‘He still saw in black and white.’ She thought to herself._

She had never really fooled herself into believing that she and Jughead could be anything more than the best of friends, of course over time her personal feelings had shifted. She noticed more often how his icy blue eyes would light up at a particularly well-timed joked, she admired the way his dark hair would stick to his snow-like skin after a light shower of rain, and she couldn’t help how her gaze would meet his lips as he sat obliviously in the corner of the booth, invested in his own words. She had hoped one day, much like Betty, that Jughead would walk into _Pop’s_ and suddenly he’d see the pale pink of the strawberry milkshake that sat waiting for him and just behind that he’d see his best friend, Erica Mars, in all the colours that the world had to offer.

Unfortunately, in some sorry yet not unheard of cases, people _would_ meet their soulmates but by a cruel twist of fate they would find that their soulmate was _not_ looking for them. There was someone else out there for them, someone better suited, someone who would bring them more happiness than the other possibly could. Heartbreaking stuff of course, yet all too true. This appeared to be the case for one Erica Mars, ever the optimist however, she revelled in the wholesome friendship that Jughead Jones gave to her so willingly, and silently she thanked him for opening her eyes to the beauty that world had to offer.

-

In the booth at _Pop’s_ , Archie was questioning Betty and Ronnie about the hues and saturations of everything and anything, eagerly making notes in the notebook that was dedicated to his music. Erica took a quiet moment to reflect on the brooding boy that sat in the corner of the booth, as of lately he always appeared to be hunched over his laptop screen. The electronic blues and whites of the screen drained what little colour he had from his face and accentuated the newly ever present purple circles under his eyes. He bit on his pale pink lips, speckled with dried white flakes of skin from the constant chewing and chapped from the cold winds of Riverdale. A question from Archie drew Erica away from her intense and concerned studying.

_‘What colour eyes does Erica have?’_

Betty, who sat to her left, drew her hands underneath Erica’s chin, directing her face towards her and gazed studiously into her eyes.

_‘Well,’ she began, ‘at first they look like they could just be brown,’ Betty smiled thoughtfully, ‘but then if you look a little closer you can see hints of gold flakes shimmering just underneath the surface.’_

Erica smiled gently back at the face of Betty Cooper. Never had she considered her eyes as anything other than murky pools of brown water, boring and dull, unable to capture the attention of the one person that universe had marked as hers. To think of them as glistening with leaves of gold-  

_‘You forgot the green.’_

The sound of Jughead’s fingers hitting heavily against the keyboard was the only sound that could be heard through the deafening silence that followed. Archie and Veronica whipped their heads around to search for the owner of the voice.

_‘What?’ Betty laughed incredulously._

_‘How would you know?’ Veronica’s brow furrowed._

The typing ceased suddenly, the weight of his words lay heavily on his shoulders and his heart, his best kept secret had been revealed in an instant. His fingers locked, as did his jaw, his back teeth ground in self-disgust and tightly he closed his eyes.

_‘Jughead, can you see in colour?’_


End file.
